The present invention relates to an illumination device using one or more fluorescent tubes, and also relates to a liquid crystal display (LCD) apparatus using the illumination device.
FIG. 12A shows a front view of one prior known LCD television (TV) receiver 101, and FIG. 12B is a back view showing main parts of the LCD TV shown in FIG. 12A on a backface thereof.
In addition, FIG. 13A is an enlarged cross-sectional view of the LCD TV as taken along a line E-E of FIG. 12A, and FIG. 13B is its enlarged cross-sectional view taken along a line F-F of FIG. 12A.
As shown in FIG. 12A, the prior art LCD TV 101 has a display screen G for visual display of video images thereon. When displaying a video image on this display screen G, light is emitted for transmission to an LCD panel 102 (see FIGS. 13A and 13B) from its backside, and the panel is voltage-controlled in accordance with the video image, resulting in the image being displayed on the screen.
As shown in FIGS. 13A and 13B, this LCD TV 101 is generally made up of the LCD panel 102 and an illumination device 101S which is placed behind the LCD panel 102 for supplying light to the LCD panel 102 from its backside (rear surface side of drawing sheet of FIG. 12A). The LCD panel 102 is rigidly attached to the illumination device 101S by an upper frame 103.
The LCD panel 102 changes the transmissivity of the light that passes through a liquid crystal (LC) layer in a way corresponding to respective pixels constituting the image to be displayed, thereby controlling the transmission and non-transmission of the light from the illumination device 101S for displaying the image on the display screen G (see FIG. 12A) by a transmission degree of the light of a color filter.
FIG. 14 is an exploded view of the LCD TV 101 shown in FIG. 12A when looking at from its front side (top face side of drawing sheet of FIG. 12A).
As shown in FIG. 14, the illumination device 101S (see FIGS. 13A and 13B) has a plurality of fluorescent tubes 104 for use as a light source unit, an inverter 105 for driving the fluorescent tubes 104, a lower frame 106 for disposing the fluorescent tubes 104, a reflection sheet 106h which is disposed along a front face of the lower frame 106 for reflecting light rays of the fluorescent tubes 104 toward the LCD panel 102 side, a light diffusion plate 107 for diffusing the light as output from the fluorescent tubes 104, an optical sheet 108 for control of an angular distribution or the like of the light that enters the LCD panel 102, an intermediate mold frame 109 which fastens the optical sheet 108 and light diffusion plate 107 to the lower frame 106 and which mounts thereon the LCD panel 102, and an upside mold 110 which functions as a light shield wall of right and left end portions of the display screen.
Note here that FIG. 14 shows main parts or components only, and there are many other members.
As shown in FIG. 12B, several structural members are disposed on the non-display plane side of the LCD TV 101, and the members include circuit components, such as a timing controller Tcon, the inverter 105, a power supply unit 111 and others.
Additionally, prior art bulletins of the invention in relation to this application include JP-A-2007-59406 (in its paragraphs [0022] to [0024]) and JP-A-2007-18423.
JP-A-2007-59406 discloses therein a display apparatus of the type using an external electrode fluorescent lamp as a back-light thereof. JP-A-2007-18423 teaches a display device which uses an internal electrode fluorescent lamp as its backlight: in FIG. 8 of this Japanese patent bulletin, a similar arrangement to that shown in FIG. 13A of the present application is depicted.